Growing with gratitude for life's challenges
“Sometimes I just wish I could roll back the years and start over.” “Hard to imagine it. Life would have been very different.” Our what if’s are wistful, laced with regrets. Not that we had any power over what happened – we were only children when decisions that would affect us forever after were made. […]
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“I’m quite happy to spectate,” I offer when the cry goes out for team members. It’s Friday night, and darts are the big event at the neighbourhood clubhouse. “No! No! You must play. Everyone plays.” This is our second social this week in our new community, and I must say the locals are friendly and […]
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“I’m not as smart as you. I’d probably be okay if I was smarter.” “That’s not true, June. You are very smart.” “Do you really think so?” My sister and I are doing dishes after supper. June suffers from paranoid schizophrenia. “You got 96% in your nursing program,” I remind her. “Intelligence is not your […]
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Relationship, I realized after posting my weekly challenge, is too broad of a subject. We need a lifetime to examine and appreciate our interconnections, and then, likely, we’d need to begin again – such is the nature of relationship. It slips and slides, rewards and betrays, teaches and takes away. That said, I appreciate those […]
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“Whatever it is we need to learn from each other, I say let’s do it now, so we don’t have to come back and repeat it,” I told my father once during a period in which I was exploring the concept of reincarnation. I imagine he lowered his chin and looked over his spectacles at […]
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I am the one who put forth the relationship challenge this week, and I have to confess, I am struggling with how to articulate my feelings. Fast approaching my sixtieth birthday, I find I am sentimental, or maybe, it’s that after years of isolation due to illness, I now treasure relationship more than ever. […]
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“The people we are in relationships with are always a mirror, reflecting our own beliefs, and simultaneously we are mirrors, reflecting their beliefs.” – Shakti Gawain A friend of mine used to say (and I paraphrase). “May you experience as many relationships […]
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First, a thank you to all who participated in this week’s challenge, and to those who took the time to comment. This interaction means so much to me – maybe more than I can ever articulate. Up until 2004 – when I returned to university to become a teacher – I practiced an examined life: […]
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An orange flash dipped in front of the truck, with no time to veer. We arrived at our destination to find a Baltimore oriole embedded in the front grill. I was heartbroken. At any other time, the appearance of an oriole would be auspicious. Usually showing up in pairs, these birds arrive in summer and […]
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“If it would help, I could get you a bacon press.” I am poised over the hot frying pan, waiting to flip a quesadilla. Waving the spatula at him, I give him my best stink eye. “What?” “I thought you said you wanted to keep up the minimalist lifestyle?” “I do, and having a […]
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One Woman's Quest II 